Sounds like the company was trying to mark a box in a green 'certification' program by installing the rack and encouraging bicycling in other ways, but doesn't actually want people to use a bike, they just want to be able to say they meet whatever green standard they've paid consultants to meet.

I'm pro environment, I've even made a decent living at working in the environmental compliance field, but these green certification programs are mostly a way for consultants to make money, and a way for a company to make themselves look good while not actually accomplishing much.

This sounds weird, but from the perspective of the developer, the bike rack isn't about people riding to work.

The bike rack represents LEED points toward a silver, or gold, or whatever rating for the building's 'green-ness.'

I'm not sure how a better LEED rating helps the developer, beyond just marketing, but I assume they get a more favourable tax rate or subsidies, or an easier time in the permitting/urban planning process.

IIRC, the point value of a bike rack may be somewhere on the level of using low volatile sealants or something like that.

In Madison, Wisconsin, there's sort of the opposite problem. Biking is terribly, terribly chic and everyone is tripping over themselves to enable it. Between the dedicated bike trails running out to the suburbs and the bike lanes on major downtown streets, you can get pretty much anywhere. Which is great, but it leaves out a few unfortunate businesses located off the trail-serviced areas. At least one of them has solved this problem by creating a fake trail leading into some tall grass and coming out absolutely nowhere useful.

So from the outside, what you see is a beautifully paved bike trail leading up to gleaming bike racks, because XYZ Corp. is a fun and healthy place to work and supports their hippie employees, etc. I admire the ballsiness of this.

buzzcut73:Sounds like the company was trying to mark a box in a green 'certification' program by installing the rack and encouraging bicycling in other ways, but doesn't actually want people to use a bike, they just want to be able to say they meet whatever green standard they've paid consultants to meet.

I'm pro environment, I've even made a decent living at working in the environmental compliance field, but these green certification programs are mostly a way for consultants to make money, and a way for a company to make themselves look good while not actually accomplishing much.

The story is somewhat ambiguous but from what I gather Molly works at a business that rents space in a commercial building owned by Cadillac-Fairview (a large commercial real estate company), and is not an employee of CF herself. They probably put the bike racks there for customers visiting the building and want workers to either take their bikes inside their offices, or park at the rear of the building. Similar policies apply to cars:There's a CF owned building near my work and they have a policy that the front parking lot is customers only, and all building employees must park in the back or off-site.

If that's their goal they should put racks at the rear as well or offer indoor bike storage (in many cities this a mandatory feature when building new commercial and residential buildings).

how does one get a parking ticket on a bike, I could understand if the rider was physically present, but a ticket attached to my bike would end up in the dumpster, I mean do they have license plates for bikes there or something? how do they know who it belongs to?

buzzcut73:Sounds like the company was trying to mark a box in a green 'certification' program by installing the rack and encouraging bicycling in other ways, but doesn't actually want people to use a bike, they just want to be able to say they meet whatever green standard they've paid consultants to meet.

Possibly not even any LEED-esque certification. At least in my city, X number of bike rack spaces per load is a requirement for any public building constructed in the last 30 years, just like Y number of parking spaces. Zoning/building code thing. And this is in Kansas... I'd be shocked if Vancouver didn't have such a building code.

Pribar:how does one get a parking ticket on a bike, I could understand if the rider was physically present, but a ticket attached to my bike would end up in the dumpster, I mean do they have license plates for bikes there or something? how do they know who it belongs to?

My undergraduate school tried that with cyclists parking their bikes wherever the hell they wanted before class.

The university has a code of conduct for students which required students to honor the wishes the university. It worked out about as well as voluntary taxes.

This is my thirteenth season (April-October) of riding my bike to work. For the first eight years I would keep my bike in an empty cubical in the office. Nobody had a problem with this. Then we got a new Division Head who said it was "unprofessional" and stopped me from using cubicals for the bike. I found a spot in the storage space to lock it up on another floor. The bike only retails for $3200, so it ain't going on an outside bike rack (which we had, sorta, until the snowplow wiped it out). The Head is a dick basically, a domineering bully. He's hated by all, morale is in the pits, and I'm retiring as soon as the farm is ready to move into....

nytmare:edmo: I wish this was some sort of rare screwball corporate/government moment. Wish.

Yes, that's why it's on the news, because it's really common; happens all the time. The news only prints stuff that occurs frequently.

Well some person on the internet really isn't the news. However corporate contradictions like this are very common. Most are not known outside the doors of the company that issued them though. Only those of a special topic that appeals to a readership and for some reason are known outside a particular company get attention.

This one has the special 'carbon footprint' topic plus it's about a building management company rather than any person's particular employer. Thus nobody who works in the building for a company that rents there has to fear for his job by putting the landlord's stupid policies on display.

EvilEgg:If they were so concerned they could perhaps provide a bike room. That way no one has to know that dirty hippies work there.

My company does almost exactly that--people who bike to work can park their bikes in a rack under one of the stairwells. And since you need an RFID badge to get in the building (and one must pass a criminal background check to work here), there's practically no risk of theft.

That being said, I'm in Silicon Valley, where it's not just the hippies who bike to work.

This could also be the case of a company's right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. It's frustratingly common. I have a lot of experience with this, and I even have a sorta-similar bicycle story.

My employer was fine with me parking my bicycle in my office. The building security guards were not. But the guards worked for the building owner, and we were tenants. But the guards couldn't go into the offices, so once the bike was in my office, it was fine, So if a guard caught me walking through the lobby with a bike, I'd catch hell.

You'd think this could be resolved, but a multinational corporation vs a sprawling billion dollar property management company? There was no appropriate level at which to address it.

Plant Rights Activist:the note is there because a fixed gear isn't a real mode of transportation it's an inefficient and cumbersome way of expressing your hipsterdom.

That isn't a fixie. It's a cruiser. Freewheel. Brakes. You know, stuff that comes in handy riding in city traffic. Sure, it's slow and heavy, but it is legitimate transportation. Or maybe you just don't know what a fixed gear is.